MPs consider plan to stem voter registration crisis
By: News Archive
Elections experts from the University of East Anglia (UEA) and Bite The Ballot will today tell parliamentarians they must consider immediate action to stem a growing voter registration crisis.
Dr Toby James, a senior lecturer in British and Comparative Politics in UEA’s School of Politics, has collaborated with the pressure group Bite The Ballot (BTB) to compile a draft 24-point plan. Dr James and colleagues will present the draft report, called 'Getting the missing millions back on electoral register,' at the all-party parliamentary group on democratic participation chaired by Conservative MP Chloe Smith.
The draft report details a long-term rise in the number of people missing from the electoral register. In 2014, it was estimated that up to 7.5 million eligible voters were missing from the electoral register.
When individual electoral registration (IER) – the largest reform to electoral register for a century – was completed in December 2015, it became clear that “despite some positive reforms, the evidence is that the registration crisis has worsened,” said Dr James.
A further 1.4 million names have been removed from the electoral register during the implementation of IER and there has been a 40 per cent drop in the number of ‘attainers’ - 16- and 17-year-olds who will turn 18 during the period in which the register is in force.
The importance of the missing millions has intensified because the electoral register is now used to draw an electoral map for general elections. This means that those groups or regions underrepresented on the register will be underrepresented in the UK Parliament and government.
Dr James said: “Under-registration is a serious problem because it can deny citizens their democratic right to vote.
“Studies suggest that many citizens think they are on the register because they pay their council taxes and assume that the government ‘knows about them’.
“Worryingly, research conducted by UEA and Newcastle University showed that many would-be voters were turned away from the polls at the 2015 general election because they were not registered. Two-thirds of polling stations turned away at least one would-be voter.”
Oliver Sidorczuk, advocacy coordinator at Bite The Ballot, said: “There are 7.4 million 16- to 24-year-olds in the UK. With up to a third of young voters missing from the register, and only 43 per cent turning out to vote in 2015, the need for active citizenship is clear.
“Our draft report highlights the fact that if we’re going to get voter registration reform right, the debate has to rise above party politics or British democracy will suffer.
“This draft report urges every decision-maker, educator, electoral administrator, campaigner and academic to work together and radically improve our registration system. It’s the only way we’ll strengthen and modernise UK democracy for the long-term.”
In June 2014, the government began the transition to IER, putting the onus on individuals to register themselves and provide a National Insurance number when applying to register to vote. Only once their name had been checked against government databases would they be added to the register. Prior to this, a ‘head of household’ could register everyone living in each address.
Dr James warned Parliament in 2011 that this reform might lead to a further decline in the completeness of the electoral register, with the decline likely to hit young people the hardest.
Furthermore, early findings from a new survey of electoral administrators by Dr James found two-thirds of administrators agreed the accuracy of the register had increased – but the same percentage also said citizens had complained to them about the registration process being bureaucratic. Roughly half of the administrators thought the completeness of the register had declined. The survey results are included in the report ‘Getting the missing millions back on the electoral register’.
The transition to IER has also had a dramatic effect on those running elections. Half of staff said they had thought about leaving their job at some point in the last year, according to the survey.
Dr James said: “There has been a perfect storm in local government, with enormous pressures on those running elections.
“The move to IER has involved major organisational and technological change in the context of major cuts to the funding of local government. It has put a huge strain on many staff, who are often over-worked. A lack of staff retention means lost knowledge and experience, which is vitally important for well-run elections.”
Dr James and Bite The Ballot suggest 14 short-term solutions, including calls to:
- Replicate the Northern Ireland ‘schools initiative’ throughout Great Britain
- Coordinate a specific registration drive to target 16- and 17-year-old ‘attainers’
- Register students annually when they enrol in college or university
- Publish a detailed evaluation of innovations designed to improve the completeness of the register
- Strengthen the funding of electoral registration services
- Include civil society groups and academics in government reviews on registration
- Support the Law Commission's proposals to consolidate electoral law
Longer-term remedies include:
- Introducing a national website for citizens to check their own registration status online
- Encouraging citizens to register to vote online when they access other government services such as paying council tax, renewing car taxes or registering for benefits (drawing lessons from the USA’s ‘motor voter’ registration via driver’s licences)
- Reintroducing National Insurance number cards when notifying 15-year-olds of their NI number; enabling the option to request an NI number (or a reminder of a number) online
- Introducing automatic voter registration
The all-party parliamentary group on democratic participation meets at 10am on Tuesday 8 March in committee room 9 in the Houses of Parliament. The event is open to the public.
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